About Richter Belmont, PhD
I'm a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University School of Medicine studying how brain activity and motor function change after stroke. I work at the intersection of experimental and computational neuroscience, building analysis pipelines that connect neural activity to behavior. My focus is turning noisy biological datasets into interpretable, reproducible measurements that can guide both basic neuroscience and translational neurotechnology.
Highlights
- —Experimental + computational neuroscience across mice, rats, and C. elegans.
- —Experience in behavior assays, rodent neurosurgery, machine learning, and genetic engineering.
- —Open-source stroke analysis tools: InfarQuant and Open Field Behavior Analysis.
- —End-to-end pipeline design from data collection to quantification and export.
Research path
I began in behavioral neuroscience at Bowling Green State University, studying how striatal lesions alter reward-motivated behavior in rats. That work gave me my first hands-on experience with rodent behavior, neurosurgery, and histology. In graduate school, I shifted to C. elegans circuit neuroscience, dissecting how specific neurons shape behavior using calcium imaging, optogenetics, molecular cloning, and genetic manipulation.
Current focus
As a postdoc, I build experimental paradigms and analysis pipelines to assess how stroke alters rodent motor cortex function and motor behavior. This work combines calcium imaging, optogenetics, rodent neurosurgery, immunohistochemistry, computer vision, and machine learning, with a strong emphasis on usable research software.
Long-term direction
I'm especially motivated by brain-computer interfaces as a path to treating severe neurological disability. I want to help build tools that move us toward practical recovery solutions for conditions such as paralysis, aphasia, and apraxia.